11/24/2009 @ 6:00PM

Google's Plan To Map The World

The navigation service industry shuddered last month after
Google
announced its first turn-by-turn navigation program, Google Maps Navigation. Like most Google programs, Maps Navigation is free to consumers, making paid services from other nav companies look pricey–or worse, unnecessary–in comparison.

Nav companies took solace in the fact that Maps Navigation currently only works in the U.S., on
Google’s
Android mobile platform, and–for now–on just a few phones, including the Motorola Droid and the T-Mobile myTouch 3G/HTC Magic. But chatter that Google is soliciting European mapping data has some nav companies considering shutting their doors.

Google is said to be working with Automotive Navigation Data, a Netherlands-based digital map provider, to get detailed mapping data of Europe. Though not as well known as rivals
Navteq
and Tele Atlas, AND says it is the third-largest global provider of geospatial software. It was founded in 1984 and maintains a database of roads that link more than 200 countries. The company says several major Internet-based mapping services, such as Mapquest and
Microsoft’s
Bing Maps, rely on its data for some geographical areas. Google has used AND data for its Africa maps for several years.

A broader Google/AND tie-up is logical because other map providers have opted not to support Maps Navigation in order to protect their own franchises and paid licensing deals. (See “Google’s Navigation Bombshell.”) AND has been coy about a possible alliance. In its 2008 financial statement, released in April 2009, it noted that it “recently signed a license agreement with a large U.S. company for the use of its maps of Western Europe” and expected sales to triple and profit to increase five-fold in 2009 due to the partnership. AND has never named the “U.S. company.”

A spokesman for AND declined to comment on a possible deal with Google but said AND is moving quickly to map Western Europe. It has already completed several countries, including the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Portugal and Spain. The rest will be finished by the first quarter of 2010.

Google may be looking to use AND data for maps outside Europe, too. AND says it is in talks with mapmakers in China, the Middle East and North America with the goal of mapping the entire world.

Google spokeswoman Carolyn Penner told Forbes, “We understand [Google Maps Navigation (Beta)] is valuable to users around the world, but we don’t have a road map to announce at this time.”

Industry insiders like Nick Black say the partnership is real and will produce results soon. “I can guarantee Google will release navigation in Europe in the first or second quarter of 2010,” says Black, the founder of geospatial services start-up CloudMade. “There is probably six months until navigation is a de facto offering on Android phones. As soon as AND finishes their European maps, Google will use them.”

Free turn-by-turn maps of Europe are a major threat to some nav service providers, in part because many of these firms are based in Europe, with predominantly European customers. Nicolas Gramlich says he will likely cease working on his navigation application, AndNav, if Google extends its service to Europe. Like Google Maps Navigation, AndNav is free and runs on Android phones. Its users number in the hundreds of thousands. It is particularly popular in Western Europe, in part because it relies on open-source mapping data from an organization based in the United Kingdom.

Google’s navigation service has altered the landscape for these independent developers. “Up to now, we had the advantage of being the only navigation provider offering a free service [on Android phones],” says Gramlich. If Google targets Europe, AndNav–a two-person shop run by Gramlich and another developer, Pascal Neis–will make AndNav open-source and allow interested outsiders to work on it, Gramlich says.

Nav4all, another mobile navigation provider, says Google is poised to become the third major provider of digital maps after Navteq and Tele Atlas. The company, which provides free navigation applications for Android phones, as well as BlackBerrys and
Nokia
handsets and others, hasn’t yet been hurt by the Google announcement because the number of devices that run Google’s nav service is still limited, says Chief Executive Hennie J.M. Groot Koerkamp.

But he admits that Google could corner the navigation market in as little as three years once it amasses enough geo-data from the camera-equipped cars it has been deploying around the world since 2007. “For sure, we will be in trouble then,” says Groot Koerkamp.

Nav4all isn’t closing shop yet. On Jan. 1, it plans to start charging for its mobile software. The move reflects Groot Koerkamp’s resolve to forge ahead despite the Google threat. “At this moment, we still have many chances to make a nice product and a lot of money in this market,” he says. “In the short term, we can do good business.”

Others are more optimistic. “Robert K,” the developer behind the Android mapping service RMaps, says he will continue to offer his application. While acknowledging he “cannot compete with Google,” he notes that navigation is just one feature in his app, which also lets users search maps and locate points of interest.

CloudMade is taking a different approach. It is developing tools that enable independent developers to create specific types of maps suited for bicyclists, hikers or other hobbyists. “Google has taken one horizontal slice out of the mapping market, but there are a lot of verticals left,” says Black. “You can’t have all the world-leading apps built by one company.”